Twenty year old Ellie Quin thought that escaping her mundane rural life for the exotic domed city of New Haven would be the height of adventure, only to be topped by traveling off-planet at the earliest possible opportunity. Reality set in quickly as Ellie discovered that the city owed her nothing, and her dreams for leaving Harper’s Reach behind were quickly set aside for the necessity of focusing her efforts on simply surviving.

Help came first in the form of an older pilot named Aaron and then from a fearless city girl named Jez. With the support of these two unlikely friends, Ellie Quin had piled adventure on top of adventure, blissfully unaware that she was more than a simple farm girl and that the man sent to find and kill her was coming ever closer to discovering her whereabouts.

For Ellie Quin holds within her the key to humanity’s survival, or their undoing, and her adventures to date are about to pale in comparison to the sobering reality of coming face-to-face with death.

Alex Scarrow’s serialized Ellie Quin story continues with Beneath the Neon Sky, a story that takes the fun-factor of the first two volumes and hooks them up to a 110 volt line, jolting the reader with shockingly unexpected events. Since first discovering Ellie Quin, I have envisioned Alex Scarrow’s series as a contemporary Heinlein juvenile. The combination of gee-whiz science fictional elements and a charmingly naive female protagonist led to favorable comparisons with two of my favorite Robert A. Heinlein stories, Podkayne of Mars and the novella, The Menace From Earth.

With Beneath the Neon Sky, the threat of danger that has been steadily growing in the background comes center stage and Alex Scarrow gives readers a clear image of just how villainous is Ellie’s as-yet-unknown enemy. While the Ellie Quin series may give off some Heinlein vibes, Alex Scarrow takes his young protagonist to places Heinlein would never have gone (or more accurately that his editors at the time would not allow him to go, re: Heinlein’s original plans for the ending of Podkayne of Mars).

I often worry that in describing a protagonist as “likeable” that I am marginalizing the character, similar to when I feel compelled to label a story as “fun”.   However, both are apt descriptions when discussing the Ellie Quin novels.  In an interview last year on SF Signal, Scarrow himself describes his series has having “big ideas, strong likeable characters” and his imagined setting as a “madcap, colourful, vibrant universe full of really fun ideas”.  And the Ellie Quin series delivers the fun, in spades.  There is a boy-in-a-candy-shop sense of wonder to the decorative elements of Alex Scarrow’s future.  Futuristic gadgets and gizmo’s abound and while they are fun in the best sense of the word, it is the characters that populate this universe that will have you coming back for more.

Ellie Quin starts out naive, but not in an annoying, aw-shucks way, and her growth progresses steadily, as happens in real life as circumstances force one to become more mature (or not).  Both Aaron and Jez start out as wild cards, hinting at all sorts of story possibilities that give an edge of uncertainty to the Ellie Quin books right from the very beginning.  That uncertainty bears fruit in Beneath the Neon Sky.  The adventures are many and varied as both Ellie and Jez work with the goal of saving enough money to buy passage off-planet, while remaining unaware that Deacon, Scarrow’s shadowy menace, is coming ever closer to shattering those dreams.

Alex Scarrow is self-publishing this series in ebook format and each volume is a steal.  I would warn against making the mistake of equating “self-published” with “low quality”.  Alex Scarrow is a successful British author whose teen series, Timeriders, is published through the traditional route and has recently seen the publication of its eighth novel.  He has honed his craft over several books and the Ellie Quin stories are worth checking out.

Ellie Quin vol 3: Beneath the Neon Sky shocked me, surprised me, and left me glad that the fourth volume, Ellie Quin in Wonderland, is now available.  I am very fond of this girl and the friends in her orbit and I am enjoying the fact that Alex Scarrow is not afraid to embrace the FUN in his science fiction while also keeping his readers on edge.

You can find my non-spoiler reviews of the first two Ellie Quin volumes here:

Volume 1: The Legend of Ellie Quin

Volume 2: The World According to Ellie Quin

Alex Scarrow is a British author of the popular teen science fiction series, Timeriders. The ninth book in the series is currently awaiting publication.

Scarrow is self-publishing the Ellie Quin series, the fourth volume of which, Ellie Quin in Wonderland, is now out in ebook format and is available for free (so grab a copy now and then get the first book and fall in love with Ellie for yourself).

Stay tuned for an updated interview, guest post on self-publishing vs. traditional publishing, and a review of the latest book all on SF Signal in the coming weeks.